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Changelog

Updates, changes, and improvements at Retool.

56 posts tagged with "Apps"

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Debug Tool filtering

Lam Tran
Software Engineer

Filtering is now supported in the Console and State tabs of the Debug Tools.

Users can filter logs and states using any free text, negation, regex, or exact phrases:

  • Free text: Matches any string.
  • Negation: Prefix with - to exclude a match. For example: -error
  • Regex: Use slashes for regex. For example: /^foo/
  • Exact phrases: Wrap multi-word strings in quotes. For example: "query failed"

You can combine filters using spaces (e.g. "query failed" -/error/ success).

This change is currently rolling out to users on Retool Cloud. It is not yet available on Self-hosted Retool.

App page save compaction

Luke Foster
Software Engineer

Retool made internal improvements that streamline the way we save and store your app saves, resulting in quicker app load times for users.

These improvements are automatically applied to customers on Retool Cloud. If your organization is self-hosted, run the following shell command in your backend container to remove old entries for apps that have been deleted and compact data from app edits older than a month:

./retool_backend --run-pagesave-compaction

Run this command as often as necssary to clean up your database.

You can also pass in an optional --concurrency parameter to specify the number of concurrent connections to the database in order to speed up the process. For example, --concurrency 4 opens 4 connections. The default value is 1.

Bulk component editing

Jeffrey Bui
Jeffrey Bui
Software Engineer
Jynnie Tang
Software Engineer

You can now select multiple components and edit them at the same time using the Inspector. Select multiple components by clicking and dragging a selection box around them, or by using / + click.

When bulk editing components of the same type, such as two Buttons, you can edit all properties of the component. When bulk editing different types of components, such as a Button and a Text Input, you can edit the properties shared by the two components.

Properties that differ between components are identified as Mixed in the Inspector.

In-place conversion to multipage

Isabella Borkovic
Software Engineer

You can now convert legacy single-page apps to multipage without needing to leave the IDE. Navigate to the Pages tab, and click Convert to multipage.

If you change your mind and want to undo this change, navigate to the Releases and history Releases and history tab and revert your app to the change before the Migrated app to multipage change.

Creating new single-page apps is no longer supported.

Single-page apps can no longer be created

Matthew Carroll
Software Engineer

The legacy option to create single-page apps has now been deprecated and is no longer available. Going forward, all newly created Retool apps support multiple pages, and newly created mobile apps support multiple screens.

Your existing single-page apps will continue to function as expected, and you are not required to migrate them. If you would like to do so, you can import legacy single-page apps as pages or use the Duplicate to multipage action on the apps landing page.

With multipage apps, Retool only evaluates the code and components of the page currently in view. The benefits of multipage apps include:

  • Greater performance of large and complex apps. Since Retool only evaluates code and components for the current page, multipage apps are 30-40% faster than a single-page app.
  • Seamless navigation between pages. Retool loads the complete app state whenever a user navigates to a single-page app. With multipage apps, navigation between pages is seamless and more responsive.
  • Improved app management. Multipage apps can replace multiple apps in your organization, such as a team's frequently used apps. This reduces the number of apps to maintain and allows for easier permission management.
  • Reduced module dependency. Modules are commonly used to create shared navigation menus across multiple single-page apps. With multipage apps, you can eliminate the need for additional modules and the complexities with maintaining them.
  • Simplified code sharing. The mechanisms for sharing code and components in multipage apps (global code, frames) are lower friction, easier to set up, and more powerful than the mechanisms for sharing code across apps (modules, query library).

The App Inspector

Isabella Borkovic
Software Engineer

The App Inspector now appears when you have the Inspector open but no component selected. The App Inspector includes the following settings that were previously found in the App Settings sidebar:

  • Browser title
  • Custom URL
  • Custom shortcuts
  • Max width

The App Inspector also includes the Persist URL parameters setting, which configures search query parameters and hash parameters to persist during page navigation and when switching pages with the “Go to Page” event handler.

Changes to ToolScript file locations

Isabella Borkovic
Software Engineer

The directory structure for apps protected using Source Control is changing to reduce the likelihood of merge conflicts.

Component positioning information (stored in ToolScript files) is now organized by page. The apps directory contains a .positions directory, which contains one file per page in the format .pageName.positions.json.

Previously, all positioning information was stored in one .positions.json file. The new structure prevents merge conflicts.

This change is live on Retool Cloud, and it will be available in a subsequent release of Self-hosted Retool.

app-name
└── .defaults.json
└── .positions.json
└── .mobilePositions.json
└── lib
└── sqlQueryName.sql
└── jsQueryName.js
└── src
└── container1.rsx
└── functions.rsx
└── main.rsx
└── metadata.json

Drafts

Soe Myint
Software Engineer

Retool now supports Drafts, a tab of the Apps landing page that provides a personal folder for each standard user to develop and test apps. Only you and organization admins have access to view or edit apps that you create in this section. This feature is useful for organizations where creating applications and folders is restricted, because admins don't have to give users explicit permission to create apps in their Drafts.

The availability of the Drafts tab can be managed by admins in Settings > Beta.

The Drafts tab is currently rolling out on Retool Cloud and will be available on the next edge release of self-hosted Retool.

App-related Debug Tool improvements

Lam Tran
Software Engineer

Improvements to Debug Tools in the App IDE are now available.

This update includes the following changes and improvements to the Debug Tools:

  • New filters in the Linting tab: Errors and Accessibility.
  • New filters in the Performance tab: Severe, Moderate, and Minor.
  • In-line actions for automatic performance optimizations.
  • Actionable recommendations to the most common performance bottlenecks.
  • Links to relevant docs for further learning.
  • Removal of performance score and app stats.

Refer to the Web app and Mobile app best practices guides for more information.

Updates to the Retool Apps landing page

Neha Gupta
Software Engineer

Retool updated the layout of the Retool Apps landing page to reduce clutter and make it easier to find the apps you need. The updated organziation includes the following tabs:

  • Recent: The most recent 50 apps that you visited. The Viewed by me column shows the last time you opened the app, and the Location column shows you where the app is located.
  • Published: All items that you have access to within your organization. Use the dropdown to filter by Apps, Folders, Modules, and Protected.
  • Starred: The apps and folders that you starred.
  • Trash: The apps and folders in your organization that were deleted.